We know this struggle personally. As parents and doctors, we've traveled with our kids enough to realize that no existing product actually solved the in-flight hygiene problem. Sanitizers don't remove — they leave behind. Wipes create trash you can't dispose of until landing. And the airplane bathroom? It's a 3-square-foot petri dish you have to wait 20 minutes to access.
That's why we developed NOWATA™ — a plant-based, rinse-free soap that physically removes dirt, oil, and 99.9% of germs* through our clumping technology. No water. No sink. No residue. Just apply at your seat, rub until the clumps capture what's on your hands, brush off, and you're done. We've tested it at 35,000 feet with our own kids, and it's now essential carry-on gear for every family trip we take.
Below, we'll share what we've learned about keeping hands genuinely clean during flights — and why removing germs beats killing them every time.
TL;DR Quick Answers
What is waterless soap and how does it work?
Waterless soap is exactly what it sounds like — real soap that cleans your hands without water, rinsing, or wiping. Unlike hand sanitizers that use alcohol to kill some germs in place, waterless soap physically removes contaminants from your skin.
Here's how NOWATA™ works in three steps:
Apply a small drop to dry hands
Rub hands together for 15–20 seconds until visible clumps form
Brush off the clumps — dirt, oil, and 99.9% of germs go with them*
What makes it different from sanitizer:
Key facts at a glance:
Who made it: Dr. Ruslan Maidans (DDS) and Dr. Yalda Shahriari (PhD, Biomedical Engineering)
How it's tested: Swiss laboratory verified using ASTM E1174 protocols
How many uses: 80–100 per bottle
Who it's for: Parents, travelers, outdoor enthusiasts, teachers — anyone who needs clean hands without a sink
What it saves: Up to 2 gallons of water per use
We developed NOWATA™ because our family needed a soap that actually removes what's on your hands — not just disinfects over it. No water. No alcohol. No residue. Just clean.
*Based on laboratory testing using a modified ASTM E1174 test, NOWATA physically removed over 99.9% of virus (Murine Norovirus, a human norovirus surrogate) and bacteria (E.coli) particles from skin. Results do not imply disease prevention. For hand cleansing only.
Top takeaways
The airplane bathroom isn't a hand hygiene plan. Messes happen during takeoff, turbulence, and descent — exactly when the bathroom is off limits. Rinse-free soap at your seat means clean hands don't wait for the seatbelt sign.
Sanitizers disinfect. They don't clean. Alcohol neutralizes some germs on contact. It doesn't remove:
Dirt and food residue
Oil and grime
Dead germ particles
NOWATA™ captures all of it into visible clumps you brush away. Nothing stays on your skin.*
Airplane surfaces are dirtier than you think. Studies have found fecal bacteria on the surfaces your family touches most:
Tray tables — more bacteria per square inch than lavatory flush buttons
Seatbelt buckles — touched by every passenger, rarely sanitized
Armrests and door handles — contaminated between deep cleanings
What your hands pick up between boarding and baggage claim matters.
Why airplane bathrooms aren't the hygiene solution you think they are
Most travelers assume a quick trip to the lavatory solves the cleanliness problem. The reality is less reassuring. Airplane bathrooms serve hundreds of passengers between deep cleanings, and the surfaces inside — faucet handles, door locks, toilet flush buttons — are among the most germ-dense spots on the entire aircraft. You walk in with dirty hands and often walk out having touched a dozen new contaminated surfaces along the way.
Then there's the access problem. During taxi, takeoff, turbulence, and descent, the bathroom is completely off limits. For families with young children, that's precisely when messes happen most. You're left waiting with sticky, grimy hands and no good options until the seatbelt sign clicks off again.
What sanitizers get wrong at 35,000 feet
Hand sanitizers have become the default in-flight solution, but they were designed to kill germs — not clean your hands. There's an important difference. Alcohol-based sanitizers neutralize some bacteria and viruses on contact, but they don't remove the dirt, food residue, oil, and dead germ particles still sitting on your skin. Your hands may be disinfected, but they're not actually clean.
For parents, there's another concern. Sanitizer residue stays on your child's hands long after application. When those hands inevitably end up near their mouth — and they will — your child is ingesting whatever the sanitizer left behind. We faced this exact dilemma with our own kids, and it's one of the reasons we developed a completely different approach.
How NOWATA's clumping technology actually cleans without water
NOWATA™ works on a principle most people haven't encountered before: physical removal. Instead of using chemicals to kill germs in place, our plant-based formula binds to dirt, oil, and 99.9% of germ particles on your skin and forms visible clumps. You simply brush the clumps away, and everything trapped inside them goes with it.
Here's how it works in your seat:
Apply a small drop to dry hands. Rub your hands together for 15 to 20 seconds until you see clumps forming. Brush or wipe the clumps off with a napkin or into a trash bag. That's it — clean hands, no water, no residue, no trip to the bathroom.
The entire process takes less than 30 seconds and works on everything from pretzel grease and sticky juice fingers to the invisible layer of bacteria you picked up from your armrest. We had the formula independently tested in a Swiss laboratory using ASTM E1174 protocols, and the results confirmed what we experienced firsthand — it physically removes over 99.9% of tested virus and bacteria particles from skin.*
Why flight crews and frequent flyers are making the switch
Experienced travelers learn quickly that convenience wins on airplanes. Every item in your carry-on needs to earn its space. NOWATA™ is TSA-friendly, compact enough to fit in a seat-back pocket, and delivers 80 to 100 uses per bottle — enough for a full week of travel or several round trips.
Unlike wipes, there's nothing to throw away except a few dry clumps. Unlike sanitizer, there's no alcohol smell filling the cabin around you. And unlike the bathroom, NOWATA is available the moment you need it — during boarding, mid-meal, after turbulence, or right before landing when the seatbelt sign is locked on and your toddler just sneezed into their hands.
Cleaner flights start before the bathroom line
Flying doesn't have to mean choosing between convenience and clean hands. The bathroom will always be there, but it shouldn't be your only option — especially when it's unavailable exactly when you need it most.
We built NOWATA™ because our family needed a real solution for real travel moments. A plant-based, rinse-free soap that removes what sanitizers leave behind, works without a single drop of water, and is safe enough for the smallest hands on the plane. Toss it in your carry-on before your next flight, and stop waiting in line to get clean.
As doctors and parents, we knew sanitizers weren't enough — they kill germs but leave everything else behind on your child's hands. We created NOWATA because our family needed a soap that actually removes what's there, not just disinfects over it.
7 Resources We Recommend Before Choosing A Rinse-Free Soap for Your Next Flight
We're doctors, but we're also parents who do our homework before putting anything on our kids' skin. When we developed NOWATA™, we didn't just trust our own expertise—we dug into the research, checked the standards, and verified our claims through independent testing. We think you should have access to the same resources we relied on. Here are seven we recommend for anyone exploring rinse-free soap for travel.
1. What the CDC says about cleaning your hands when there's no sink nearby
Before we created NOWATA, we started exactly where you probably are—reading what the CDC recommends when soap and water aren't available. Their hand hygiene guidelines are the foundation for understanding your options, and we believe every parent and traveler should know them. It's also worth noting that the CDC acknowledges sanitizers don't remove all types of germs—which is exactly the gap we built NOWATA to fill.
Source: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)
URL: https://www.cdc.gov/clean-hands/about/index.html
2. TSA's carry-on liquid rules so your soap actually makes it on the plane
Nothing's worse than losing a product at security because you didn't check the rules first. (Trust us—we've watched it happen.) TSA's 3-1-1 rule covers container sizes, quart-bag requirements, and what counts as a liquid, gel, or aerosol in your carry-on. Good news: NOWATA™ is TSA-friendly and compact enough to toss in your quart-size bag with room to spare.
Source: Transportation Security Administration (TSA)
URL: https://www.tsa.gov/travel/frequently-asked-questions/liquids-aerosols-and-gels-rule
3. The science behind how soap physically removes germs from your skin
This is one of our favorite reads because it explains the exact principle NOWATA is built on. Yale School of Medicine breaks down how soap molecules bond to dirt, oil, and pathogens and physically lift them off your skin—a fundamentally different process than what sanitizers do. Understanding this distinction is what led us to develop a rinse-free soap that removes germs rather than just disinfecting over them.
Source: Yale School of Medicine
URL: https://medicine.yale.edu/news-article/why-soap-works/
4. How germy airplane surfaces really are (spoiler: the tray table is worse than the toilet)
We'll be honest—this one made us pack NOWATA in our carry-on permanently. TIME covers the TravelMath study that found airplane tray tables carry more than eight times the bacteria of lavatory flush buttons. When you picture your toddler eating crackers off that surface, the case for having real soap at your seat—not just sanitizer—becomes pretty hard to ignore.
Source: TIME
URL: https://time.com/4877041/dirtiest-places-on-airplanes/
5. A free database to check the safety of every ingredient in your soap
As parents, we don't just read labels—we look up what's behind them. The Environmental Working Group's Skin Deep database rates over 130,000 personal care products by cross-referencing ingredients against nearly 60 toxicity and regulatory databases. We encourage you to look up any product you're considering for your family, including ours. NOWATA™ is 100% plant-based, and we're proud of every ingredient on our label.
Source: Environmental Working Group (EWG)
URL: https://www.ewg.org/skindeep/
6. The lab testing standard behind legitimate germ removal claims
When a soap says it removes 99.9% of germs, the question every smart consumer should ask is: "Tested by whom, and using what protocol?" ASTM E1174 is the FDA-recognized standard for evaluating the antimicrobial effectiveness of handwash formulations. It's the benchmark we chose for NOWATA's independent testing at a Swiss laboratory—because if we're going to make a claim, we want the science to back it up.
Source: ASTM International
URL: https://www.astm.org/e1174-21.html
7. How much water traditional handwashing actually uses (and why it adds up)
We didn't create NOWATA just for convenience—we created it because water matters. The EPA reports that the average American family uses over 300 gallons of water per day at home, and personal hygiene is a real part of that number. Every time you use NOWATA instead of a sink, you save up to two gallons. Multiply that across a family of four on a week-long trip, and the impact starts to feel pretty meaningful.
Source: U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)
URL: https://www.epa.gov/watersense/how-we-use-water
Three statistics that changed how we think about hand hygiene — and why we built NOWATA
We spent months in the research before we ever formulated our first batch. Not because we needed convincing — we're doctors. But because we wanted to understand where existing products were failing families like ours. These three statistics stuck with us and ultimately shaped the product in our carry-on today.
1. Hand hygiene prevents 1 in 5 respiratory infections — but only when you can actually do it
The CDC reports that proper hand hygiene reduces:
Respiratory illnesses like colds and flu by 16 to 21%
Diarrheal illness by 23 to 40% in the general population
Those numbers are powerful. But here's the problem we kept running into as parents who fly with our kids: that protection only works if you can clean your hands when it matters.
On an airplane, the moments that matter most are the moments the bathroom is unavailable:
Takeoff and descent — seatbelt sign locked on
Turbulence — bathroom off limits, messes happening anyway
Mid-meal — tray tables down, sticky fingers everywhere
Your toddler sneezes into their palms during descent. Your preschooler grabs the tray table before snack time. The bathroom is locked, and the only thing in your bag is a sanitizer that disinfects but doesn't remove what's actually on their hands.
We built NOWATA™ because the science is clear — hand hygiene prevents illness. We just needed a product that works in seat 17B at 35,000 feet with the seatbelt sign illuminated.
Source: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention — Handwashing Facts & Statistics
URL: https://www.cdc.gov/clean-hands/data-research/facts-stats/index.html
2. American families use over 300 gallons of water a day — we started asking what we could give back
The EPA reports that the average American family uses more than 300 gallons of water daily, with roughly 70% happening indoors for bathing, cooking, cleaning, and handwashing.
When we first read that, it reframed everything. We'd been developing NOWATA™ to solve a convenience problem. But the water data showed us we were also building something with a real environmental footprint.
Here's how the math works for a family like ours:
Each traditional hand wash uses up to 2 gallons of running water
A family of four washes hands at least 8 times a day
That's roughly 16 gallons daily — just for handwashing, just for one household
We're not suggesting anyone stop washing hands at home. But for the moments when you're on a plane, on a trail, or at a playground with no bathroom — replacing even a few of those washes with NOWATA™ adds up:
Per use: up to 2 gallons saved
Per bottle: 80–100 uses, up to 200 gallons conserved
Per year, per family: 100+ gallons returned to the water supply
That's the kind of math that kept us going when the formulation got hard.
Source: U.S. Environmental Protection Agency — How We Use Water
URL: https://www.epa.gov/watersense/how-we-use-water
3. A single gram of fecal matter contains 10 million viruses — and it's already on the surfaces your family touches in-flight
We remember the exact moment this statistic changed how we thought about airplane hygiene.
The Global Handwashing Partnership reports that a single gram of human feces — about the weight of a paper clip — can contain:
10 million viruses
1 million bacteria
Now pair that with what studies have found on airplane surfaces:
Tray tables — fecal bacteria detected, often cleaned with general-purpose spray rather than disinfectant between flights
Seatbelt buckles — touched by every passenger, rarely sanitized
Armrests and lavatory door handles — contaminated by passengers who didn't wash thoroughly
As a dentist and a biomedical engineer, we understood the microbiology. As parents watching our kids eat goldfish crackers off a tray table, the implications became personal.
This is where the distinction between killing germs and removing them became non-negotiable for us:
Sanitizers neutralize some pathogens with alcohol — but the dirt, organic residue, and dead germ particles stay on your skin
NOWATA™ captures contaminants into visible clumps you brush away — germs, grime, residue, all of it. Nothing stays behind.
When our daughter puts her sanitized-but-not-cleaned fingers in her mouth, she's still ingesting whatever was there. That's not a marketing distinction. For our family, it was the entire reason we spent two years perfecting the formula.
Source: The Global Handwashing Partnership — Why Handwashing: Health
URL: https://globalhandwashing.org/about-handwashing/why-handwashing/health/
Why We Believe Rinse-Free Soap Will Become as Essential as a Boarding Pass
We've walked you through the science, the statistics, and the practical realities of keeping your hands clean on a flight. Before you go, here's an honest opinion from two doctors who are also parents, frequent flyers, and the people who spent two years in a lab solving a problem most of the world didn't realize it had.
The airplane bathroom was never designed to be your hand hygiene strategy.
It was designed to be a toilet at altitude. Everything else is an afterthought:
The sink is tiny and awkward
The water shuts off before you finish washing
The soap dispenser is empty or filled with something you'd never choose for your kids
The door handle you touch on the way out undoes whatever cleaning you just accomplished
And that's on a good day — no line, no turbulence, no seatbelt sign keeping you in your seat.
We lived with this compromise for years before we did anything about it.
We packed sanitizer like everyone else. We told ourselves it was good enough. But every time we watched our kids rub sanitizer on hands that were still visibly dirty — still coated in pretzel crumbs, playground grime, or whatever mystery substance the armrest left behind — we knew it wasn't.
The turning point wasn't one moment. It was an accumulation of small ones:
Our son licking his fingers after we'd just sanitized them on a flight to visit family
Our daughter asking why her hands still felt "icky" after a wipe that was supposed to clean them
Reading the CDC data on respiratory illness prevention and realizing our family's hand hygiene was only as good as our access to a sink — which, on a plane, was almost never
So we built something different.
Not a better sanitizer. Not a fancier wipe. A real soap that:
Works without water
Removes what other products leave behind
Is safe enough that we don't think twice when our kids put their fingers near their mouths five minutes later
Here's our honest opinion after two years of development and thousands of miles of real-world testing with our own family:
Rinse-free soap isn't a novelty. It isn't a pandemic trend. It isn't just for hikers and preppers. We believe it's the next standard piece of travel gear — as routine as packing your ID, your charger, and your headphones.
Not because we sell it. But because once you've experienced genuinely clean hands at your seat — without waiting, without rinsing, without compromise — going back to the old routine feels like a step backward.
The bathroom will always be there. We're not replacing it.
But we are giving families a way to stop depending on it for every sticky, messy, germ-covered moment that happens between boarding and baggage claim. Because those moments don't wait for the seatbelt sign to turn off — and your hand hygiene shouldn't have to either.
We created NOWATA™ for our kids first. Now we're sharing it with yours. Toss it in your carry-on before your next flight, and find out what clean hands at 35,000 feet actually feel like.
— Dr. Ruslan Maidans & Dr. Yalda Shahriari, Founders of NOWATA™
FAQ on "Waterless Soap"
Q: Is waterless soap as effective as regular soap and water?
A: We asked this ourselves before we started formulating. The answer: yes — but through a different mechanism.
How traditional soap works:
Soap loosens contaminants
Water rinses them away
Requires a sink, faucet, and 20+ seconds of running water
How NOWATA™ works:
Plant-based formula binds to dirt, oil, and germs on skin
Forms visible clumps that trap contaminants inside
You brush the clumps off — everything goes with them
No water needed because the clumping technology does the carrying
The proof: Independently tested in a Swiss laboratory using ASTM E1174 protocols. Confirmed to physically remove over 99.9% of tested virus and bacteria particles from skin.*
We tested early formulations on ourselves for months before trying them on our kids. The moment we saw visible grime lifting off our hands and collecting into clumps — that's when we knew the science had become something real.
Q: Is waterless soap safe for kids?
A: Our children were the original test case. Not in a lab — at the dinner table, in the car seat, and at the playground.
Every ingredient decision started with one question: would we be comfortable if our toddler put these fingers in her mouth 30 seconds after using this?
That question eliminated alcohol immediately.
The problem with sanitizers on kids' hands:
Most contain 60%+ alcohol that stays as residue on skin
Kids put their fingers in their mouths within minutes
Whatever the sanitizer left behind goes in with them
What's in NOWATA™:
100% plant-based formula
No alcohol, parabens, phosphates, or harsh chemicals
Nothing remains on skin after clumps are brushed away
What's not in NOWATA™:
No alcohol residue
No chemical film
No leftover germ particles
We've used it on our own kids thousands of times. It's the only hand hygiene product where we don't worry about what stays on their hands afterward.
Q: How is waterless soap different from hand sanitizer?
A: This distinction consumed two years of our lives. Here it is in plain terms:
The moment this became personal for us:
Flight home from visiting family. Our son had touched the tray table, armrest, and seatbelt buckle. We sanitized his hands. They still looked dirty. Still felt sticky. But technically — "disinfected."
He ate his goldfish crackers with those hands.
We landed. Went home. Spent the next six months reformulating until we had a product that actually removed what was there — not just killed some of what was there.
Q: Can you take waterless soap on a plane?
A: Yes. Planes were our original design use case — not an afterthought.
Why NOWATA™ was built for flying:
TSA-friendly — fits in your quart-size liquids bag
Seat-back pocket size — accessible when the overhead bin isn't
80–100 uses per bottle — covers a full week of family travel
No trash — unlike wipes, nothing to hold until landing
No alcohol smell — your seatmates will thank you
How it works at your seat:
Apply a small drop to dry hands
Rub for 15–20 seconds until clumps form
Brush off into a napkin or trash bag
Done — 30 seconds, clean hands, no bathroom trip
We've lost count of how many flights we've tested NOWATA on with our own kids. Domestic. International. Red-eyes with cranky toddlers. The routine is always the same. Once you've experienced clean hands at your seat without leaving your row, packing NOWATA becomes as automatic as packing your phone charger.
Q: Is waterless soap environmentally friendly?
A: We started out solving a parenting problem. The environmental case showed up in the research and became impossible to ignore.
What the EPA data told us:
American families use 300+ gallons of water daily
Each traditional hand wash uses up to 2 gallons of running water
Roughly 70% of household water use happens indoors
What NOWATA™ conserves:
Per use: up to 2 gallons saved
Per bottle: 80–100 uses with zero water
Per family, per year: 100+ gallons conserved on-the-go
What's in the formula:
100% plant-based — no synthetic chemicals or petroleum derivatives
Fully biodegradable — every ingredient breaks down naturally
Cruelty-free and vegan — no animal testing or animal-derived ingredients
No wet wipe waste — just dry clumps, nothing heading to a landfill
Our honest perspective after two years of living with this product: one bottle of soap doesn't save the planet. But thousands of families making one small, repeatable switch — choosing NOWATA over a running faucet for on-the-go moments — creates conservation that compounds over time.
We didn't set out to build a sustainability story. The environmental impact turned out to be built into the solution.
*Based on laboratory testing using a modified ASTM E1174 test, NOWATA physically removed over 99.9% of virus (Murine Norovirus, a human norovirus surrogate) and bacteria (E.coli) particles from skin. Results do not imply disease prevention. For hand cleansing only.
Stop waiting for the airplane bathroom — get NOWATA™ and fly with clean hands
Your next flight doesn't have to mean choosing between a 20-minute bathroom line and dirty hands. Grab a bottle of NOWATA™ today and discover what clean hands at 35,000 feet actually feel like — no water, no rinse, no compromise.
